Yeah, it is confusing. I googled, "NBA Cap 101" only to find 3-4 page long "summaries" of the NBA's cap rules.
Here's what to know:
- There is a "soft cap" of 109M for the 2019-2020 season.
- If the cap is exceeded, a team must pay a "luxury tax" of at least 150% of every dollar over 109M.
- The tax rate rises every 5M you go over the cap....and rises also if your team is a "repeat tax payer".
- There are EXCEPTIONS for your own free agents in which you can exceed the cap (see "Bird Rights"). The exceptions differ for 1 year, 2 year, and 3 year players.
- There are other EXCEPTIONS such as the "Mid Level Exception" which allows you to sign a veteran FA and exceed the cap.
- Plus a lot more little things....
Basically, when you sign and trade...you exceed the cap....and trade that "exception" to the other team. Usually, you receive some compensation for sending your own FA to another team via S&T.
Philly can afford all of these players because they have Simmons on his rookie deal and Emid as a max player....then Harris was their own FA I believe....and they added Horford. And I think they got a player for the Jimmy Butler S&T. I won't know until July 6th after I check out salaries on
www.hoopshype.com (currently, the Celts only have 8 players on their cap including Baynes...and not including the rookies).
